USA: Woman, 52, now Mom to 63-year-old friend

GRAND RAPIDS (Detroit News - Associated Press), February 20, 2005:

The elder female, who grew up in an abusive home, needs motherly love, her new mom says.

Ashley Anderson-Varney has no problem referring to her adoptive mother as "Mom," even though the other woman, at age 52, is 11 years her junior.

While dining together at their home one night, the 63-year-old woman looked across the table at Theresa Anderson-Varney and started to cry.

"She's my mom," Ashley said.

"She's the mother I always wanted, my gift from God that I prayed so long for, a mother who would want me no matter what."

Theresa stood up and hugged the woman whom she adopted three years ago.

"I am her mother," she said. "There's no question about it. She's my daughter, as much as if I had given birth to her."

Of about 400 adoptions approved in Kent County every year, a dozen or so involve the adoption of adults, said Sandy Recker, an adoption specialist and referee for the Kent County Circuit Court's family division. But those are mostly young adults, 18 or 20 years old, adopted by stepparents.

A case in which the adoptive parent is younger than the adopted child is "fairly unusual," Recker told the Grand Rapids Press. Theresa Anderson-Varney wasn't aware it was legal in Michigan until she started thinking of doing it herself.

She and Ashley had been friends for years. Theresa, a clinical psychologist without any biological children of her own, was mindful of the emotional scars that the older woman carried from her childhood and a long, troubled marriage.

On Jan. 7, 2002, Kent County Circuit Judge Kathleen Feeney signed an order approving the adoption. A new birth certificate was issued, showing that on Oct. 14, 1941, a child named Ashley Anderson-Varney was born in Byron Center. Her mother, the birth certificate says, is Theresa Anderson-Varney.

Thirteen years ago, Theresa befriended Ashley, who was working as a volunteer at a mental health agency. In 1999, she invited Ashley and her husband to move into her house, where Ashley functioned as a personal assistant and her husband took care of the lawn.

Ashley filed for divorce in 2001 after 41 years of marriage.

"God makes families in lots of different ways," said Theresa Anderson-Varney.

"I realized what God had in mind for me was to be Ashley's mom. It breaks my heart what she's been through. It's such a blessing to me that I can make such a difference to make up for those terrible things."